LOS ANGELES TIMES (editorial)
America has a stake in religious tolerance, and the Anti-Defamation League and Simon Wiesenthal Center are unfairly lumping all Muslims with the fanatics of Al Qaeda.
This page has supported construction of the center, whose name, Cordoba House, is taken from the Spanish city that stood for interfaith tolerance in the Middle Ages and whose stated mission is “promoting positive interaction between the Muslim world and the West.” ADL leader Abraham H. Foxman and Rabbi Marvin Hier of the Wiesenthal Center, however, argue that building an Islamic center so close to ground zero would be insensitive to the victims of violence committed in the name of Islam. “If after World War II, the German government had created a German cultural center across the street from Auschwitz, it would have been vehemently opposed by families of victims because it would be too much to bear,” Wiesenthal told The Times. But the examples are not parallel. The Nazi government of Germany carried out the Holocaust. The 9/11 attacks were committed by religious fanatics with a political agenda; not all Muslims were complicit, nor should they be held responsible as a group for the atrocities.
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(Thanks to Asghar Vasanwala)